In A Softer World
by Katie Havok
Summary: The evening ends, almost inevitably, with them tangled together in bed. / Newt, Tina, and the ways they get it wrong...and right.


_**Warning for smut!**_

* * *

"What do you get out of this?"

Newt presses his face deeper into Tina's hair while tightening his grip on the hot flesh of her breast. "Er—" he begins eloquently and scraps his teeth along her neck to stall for time before sighing. "Do you really want me to answer that?"

Tina turns in his arms to look at him steadily. "I really do," she murmurs and touches his cheek. "At the least, I want to know that you _aren't_ just coming around for the sex."

"It's not only for the sex," Newt says quickly, hiding his blush when she smirks at him. "I... I suppose I'm here for you, Tina. _That's_ what I get out of this."

She chews her lip thoughtfully before carding her fingers through his hair. "I'm sorry but I don't think I believe you." Newt tilts his head to the side with a questioning hum, and she nods. "If you were here for me, wouldn't you take me out or something? Sweep me off my feet, woo me, all that?" He blinks at her confusedly when she displaces him to sit up, folding her legs beneath her and warming to the subject. "Wouldn't you make an effort instead of just tumbling me into bed every time? We never _talk_ about it, Newt!"

"I didn't realize we had to," Newt says, wincing at how clipped the rebuttal sound. Tina sets her jaw while folding her arms across her chest, giving him a stubborn look when he sighs before looking down at the bedspread. "You're right, of course. What would you like me to do about it?"

Tina reaches for him after a time, carefully threading their fingers together. "Hey," she says softly. "Will you look at me?"

He does, watching her from beneath his eyelashes as she smiles faintly and tucks her hair behind her ear. The movement translates through her skin, causing her breasts to sway fetchingly. He reaches for her on instinct, cupping their heavy warmth before pulling her into his arms.

"Just take me out," Tina manages once they've tangled together comfortable, her head pillowed on his shoulder. "Take me to dinner, to see a picture — _anything_. Just show me that there's more than the physical stuff between us, Newt."

"Right. Um, Friday night, then?" he asks, dragging nervous fingers along her back.

Tina smiles up at him with unmistakable relief. "Friday night," she agrees and slides her arms around his shoulders before guiding him in for a kiss.

* * *

They meet early Friday evening, hiding their newfound awkwardness behind mumbled jokes and nervous laughter.

Newt finds Tina almost too pretty to look at in her drop-waisted dress and matching cloche hat in a particularly fetching shade of blue-gray. Seeing her dressed to the nines, with her hair even sleeker than usual, her eyes smiling up at him, makes Newt feel less like a trained monkey and more like a gentleman in his stiff new waistcoat and formal gray suit.

He kisses her knuckles in greeting while passing over a slightly crumpled but still fragrant red rose and is rewarded with a radiant smile. She takes an appreciative sniff before threading it into her hair and reaching for him, cradling his burnished jaw.

"You visited a barber for me," Tina breathes, and fingers his upper lip before touching his newly-trimmed hair. "I like it."

"Don't get used to it," Newt grumbles good-naturedly, only to smirk when Tina takes his hand to lead him down the sidewalk, pointedly looking over her shoulder and adding an extra sway to her hips.

Their date follows the standard formula: dinner and a movie, fine Middle Eastern cuisine and something with Buster Keaton that keeps them both entertained until they make their way, laughing and almost drunk on each other, into the fragrant night. Tina kisses him below the marquee, clutching at his lapels, and Newt carefully memorizes the sight of electric lights strobing across her pearly skin, making it glow, before gently reeling her in for more.

A casual stroll through midtown Manhattan leads them to a speakeasy, where they order two rounds before making their way to the dance floor. Newt holds her close as they sway together, lost in the depths of her eyes, the feel of her in his arms.

The clock has crawled past midnight, the music smoky and languid when Tina strokes the nape of his neck before leaning in, her mouth humid against his ear.

"Take me home."

Words crowd in his throat, choking him. Newt clears them away roughly before reaching up to touch her cheek, soaking in her warmth. "You're sure?"

Tina takes his hand in her own, kissing the tips of his fingers and his open palm before moving her lips down to his wrist, lingering over his fluttering pulse. His body reacts to the warmth of her mouth, and she smirks at him before guiding his hand to her waist and stepping closer, tangling her fingers in his hair and leaning their foreheads together. She stares into his eyes before closing her own, her body going slack with trust.

"Yes. I'm sure."

Newt swallows and nods, unfamiliar nerves making his hands shake when he seals them together in a deep kiss before palming his wand and stepping into Disapparition.

* * *

The evening ends, almost inevitably, with them tangled together in bed.

They land in the tiny sitting room of Newt's sublet apartment, tripping over each other in their haste to get undressed. Newt sketches his teeth along the lean column of Tina's throat before pressing his nose into the notch of her shoulder, where her scent is strongest. He exhales shakily, movements drawn in liquid hurriedness when Tina's back bows off the mattress, her legs tightening around his waist as she moans.

He muffles his gasp with her skin when her hips roll, seeking and finding the perfect angle. Tina murmurs his name and he kisses her deeply, one hand tight around her wrists to keep her arms pinned to the mattress above their heads, the other drawing teasing spirals over her breasts and torso, delighting in her answering goosebumps when he slips his fingers beneath the edge of her stocking, stroking her skin.

Tina shivers deeply before gasping, her hands clenching around the headboard. Newt skims his lips along her jaw, murmuring encouragements until her entire body seems to snap around him, tensing before dissolving into shudders, her breath catching on his name.

He groans when she spasms insistently around him, squeezing his eyes shut to prolong the inevitable before giving in with a ragged sigh, losing himself in the scent of her skin, the heat of her sex, the comfort of her mouth.

Afterward, Tina cradles him with her body as he drifts peacefully.

"Now was _that_ so hard?" she murmurs after a time, fingers tangled in his hair.

Newt lifts his head to blink at her, thoroughly flummoxed as she smirks and relaxes her legs, tangling them with his. "Our _date_ ," she clarifies patiently, smiling when he rolls his eyes in understanding. "It wasn't so awful, was it?"

"Our date was the precise opposite of awful," Newt admits, tracing the seam of Tina's dress where it's tangled around her waist and studiously avoiding her eyes. "I think it was pretty great, actually."

She deftly catches his chin, forcing him to look up at her. "In that case, don't you have something you want to say to me?" she murmurs, smiling teasingly.

"I love you," he blurts unthinkingly.

Tina draws in a sharp breath, her eyes widening, brightening, as Newt pushes himself up to look at her properly before brushing a strand of hair away from her face. "I love you," he repeats, softer now but no less insistent. "I love you, I _love_ you, I love—"

"I get it," Tina laughs as tears fill her eyes, eventually overflowing onto her cheeks. She reaches for him, cradling his face between both hands and blessing him with a radiant smile. "That isn't really what you meant to say though, is it?"

"No," Newt admits sheepishly, smiling at her through his eyelashes. "But it's true. It's just — every time I've tried to say it before now, the words got all twisted around and I couldn't spit them out." He sighs before looking at her carefully, not quite daring to get his hopes up. "Can you forgive me?"

"You're forgiven," Tina murmurs, pulling him close. "But if you couldn't say it, then is that why you showed it in, uh, other ways? Ways that weren't words, I mean."

Newt measures his breathing, almost overwhelmed by the constricting warmth in his chest. " _Yes_ ," he manages. "I had hoped you would realize I...that I wouldn't just take _any_ woman to bed, Tina, and nor would I travel halfway across the world for anyone else. Not when I have you."

Tina hums thoughtfully. "And that's why you never asked me out on an official date. You couldn't find the words. Right?"

"Yes." He allows his feelings to show in his eyes, cuffing them lightly when the vision of her face trebles and distorts. "I... _tried_. When I'd bring you lunch at work or invite you to dine with me in my case. I _tried_ , but I was never any good at talking to people. Not like you and I do, at any rate. Not like _now_."

"So you let your body do the talking." There's no condemnation in her voice, only simple wonder. He looks at her joyously before sighing, releasing his fear and doubts with a single shaky breath and nodding in confirmation.

Tina presses all of herself to him before laying back, taking him with her. "Do you have anything else you want to say to me?"

Newt gives it serious thought, at least until he sees the glimmer of humor in her eyes. "Well, I suppose I could tell you I love you some more," he murmurs when she arches beneath him, pressing her lovely breasts into his chest.

"You could," she agrees, "or you could tell me _and_ show me. You know. At the same time."

"I don't know if my poor mind could handle doing both at once," Newt admits, only to goggle down at her when she laughs musically.

"You'll never know unless you try," she breathes, and he offers no protest when she claims him in a soul-searing kiss, wiping all doubts from his mind.

* * *

Newt holds her close afterward, dragging calloused fingertips through her hair as her tears seep into his skin.

* * *

Thanks, as always, to Kemara for beta-reading, advice and encouragement. Want more from me? Come to visit me on Tumblr at katiehavok, and say hi!


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